slipstream

noun

• 1a current of air or water driven back by a revolving propeller or jet engine.
• the partial vacuum created in the wake of a moving vehicle, often used by other vehicles in a race to assist in overtaking.

• 2an assisting force regarded as drawing something along behind something else:when the US economy booms, the rest of the world is pulled along in the slipstream

verb

• (especially in motor racing) follow closely behind another vehicle, travelling in its slipstream and awaiting an opportunity to overtake: he then slipstreamed and overtook me again figurativeshe had a rocky route through the rest of adolescence while I slipstreamed smoothly behind [with object]:I planned to slipstream him in the last lap